As he sits at his desk, a few inches in front of one hand is the Bible, and a few inches in front of the other is his smartphone. Nothing in Philip now wants to reach out for the Bible, and everything in him wants to reach out for the smartphone—and one touch of the screen will become fifty, then a hundred . . . or more. Philip is experiencing the movement to low and earthly things that characterizes spiritual desolation. We may repeat once again that there is no shame in experiencing this pull: this is simply what happens in living the spiritual life in a fallen, redeemed, and loved world.
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